A3 Creation Requirements – MUV601

All builds must display

50 to 300 prims used in the construction

The the time of writing this blog my prim count stands at 174.

At least three different primitive types

Along the perimeter fence of build there are support posts with copper caps and flame lights on them. To make the copper caps I used the pyramid shape. It has been resized to fit the top of the post below it.

Sitting on the fence is a neon B shape. To make the round bits on the B I used two tubes. I used the Tube prim as it had sharp edges and suited the back straight section of the B. These have been laid on their side and cut to make two half circles. They were then resized to create the B shape.

The top of the spiral viewing platform has a hemisphere prim for the resident to stand on. I used the prim shape because it gave a good platform to stand on and matched up to the spiral well. There is an image of this further down.

I have used a sphere on the bottom of the ! exclamation mark to create the dot. As the exclamation mark I was trying to create was 3D this was the obvious choice.

At least four different forms of prim manipulation

There is a taper on the exclamation mark. This makes the cube prim used come down to almost a point above the sphere below it. I was going to use a pyramid prim but found the point to sharp so I changed to the tapered cube.

As shown in an above section I used a the cut feature to create the B shape. The tubes used were cut to 50% making the two half circles and then pushed up against the back of the B to finish the shape.

The spiral platform uses two manipulations to get the effect; Twist and Hollow. The twist manipulation is used fully to get the spiral going up the originally used cube shape. The hollow effect is then used to take the middle out of the cube. This mean that all is left is a spiral walkway type shape.

The use of different textures and colours throughout the build with consideration given.

On the spiral viewing platform I found a texture of planks of wood. This wood texture with some adjustments made follows the lines of the spiral going up the platform. To me the texture makes it look like the wood had been formed into a spiral shape to support platform and guide the avatar up.

The texture on the set of doors in the first section are different to the second section. The first section I used a wooden door texture that I stretched out so only a cross was visible on the door. I then shaded it slightly red. On the second section of the maze the doors are a plazma texture. This texture matches the center pillar and being that they are so close together I thought it suited it. It also broke the sections up a little.

Black walls in the maze because no textures worked in the confined spaces. I have mentioned this in other blogs. Having a texture on the walls of the maze was a total visual assault on the sensors. The black means that there is only two textured surfaces to look at when in the maze, the roof and floor. The roof is a neutral texture and the floor isn’t overpowering.

The posts around the perimeter fence have pyramid tops on them that colored a older copper color. This effect of old slightly weathered and oxidized copper has been furthered with the use of a concrete texture. This gives the copper a slightly pitted effect. I also added a texture manipulation of a low shininess to give it a dull look.

The exclamation mark ! information signs are coloured red to draw the user’s eye. As they contain important information I thought this was necessary.

The grass texture on the floor was used as it tied in with the overall theme in and around the maze. The green pops against the black walls in the maze and the concrete and fence textures that surround it.

The concrete texture for the walls and roof of the building was chosen to give the feeling of a sturdy structure that once you’re in there is only one way out.

Moss on the fences in a transparent texture used to make it look like the build has been there for a long time.

At least two different texture manipulations

I have implemented the glow feature in a number of locations. For example;

On the information exclamation marks to make them pop and look important

On the B shape for the link to my blog. I did this so when the user has done the maze and come back round to the start they will see it at the end on the fence. I am hopping it will catch their attention

On the lights. It doesn’t look right without a small amount of glowing coming something that is providing light.

There is bump texture on the fence posts. This is because the texture I used wasn’t made for this application so therefore it looked stretched. The checkered texture breaks takes away most of the stretched look. It also makes the post aged.

Shininess has been added to the red off buttons. This gives them a dull look like they would be used to turn a scripted function off.

The texture effect shininess is employed on the copper tops. This is used to give the copper a dull effect. The color and texture selection did not provide the look I wanted alone so I added shininess and the copper became weathered.

The appropriate use of multiple textures on a prim

On the spiral there is a number of different textures. The spiral section going up has boards of wood that follow the spiral up. Then on the side there is a metal roofing texture the is white that goes in the horizontal to the wood boards going up. I change it to this texture because with the board texture it was extremely stretched and very repetitive. The metal texture looks like it belongs with the spiral structure. On the top of the spiral there is a hemisphere for the avatar to stand on. The top flat section of the hemisphere has a ripple texture that looks like a grippy pad so the resident won’t slip off. On the underside is the bright texture of the apple. The texture has been squashed up somewhat, but the bright reds and greens add a splash of colour to the build and to me it looks like the spiral down comes from this floating orb.

Although this is a small change on the prim that makes up the wall sides are a concrete texture. But on the top where it sticks through the roof I changed it to black. When it was still concrete it was hard to differentiate it from the roof. With it being black the outside of the maze is very noticeable.

The appropriate scale for purpose both in construction and texture use

I have mention a number of times the reasons for the construction size I went for. This can be found in other blogs. Another reason that the size of construction fits is that it will work for almost any size avatar that enters the build. There are number of places that I built objects based around my height, but needless to say this height will suit many uses of second life. For the likes of the fences the height is effective in increasing the build and also they are not too high that it is stretching the texture. The floor has been set to repeat and has been scaled down a lot so that is isn’t stretched over the over 30 by 30 floor.

Complex interactivity;

A scanning system to interact with the avatar in some manner

In the middle on the maze there is an area where the two paths through converge before splitting for the two paths out of the maze. In the center of this area is a 1 x 1 meter pole. I have added a script to the post that scans for an avatar within a 2 meter radius, every 5? seconds. If it detects an avatar then it whispers a message to the avatar in the main chat saying “Half Way. You are doing well”.

An instance of scripted communication with an avatar

Along with the above communication I have an information exclamation mark at the start of the maze. This when clicked this whispers a message to the user welcoming them to the maze and giving some basic instructions.

An appropriate particle system

As explained in the design and development blog I added guide orbs to the maze. These are particle effects that float along the ground within the paths of the maze. These orbs are turned off and on using two buttons at the entrance to the maze. The particles come from prims hidden in the walls around the build. When the on button is clicked there is a message sent out on channel -2525. Each one of the particle spawning prims then has a listener in it. When they detect the on message it activates the particle effect script that is also in the prim. I have set the particle effect to decrease is size as it travels along. Each script is set with a different max age so that the orbs fade out before they reach the end of the section that they are traveling down.

A link out to a web page

On the fence surrounding my build there is a large neon B shape. This has a script in it that links out to the MUV section of this blog, when clicked on.

The sitting of an avatar on a prim with the purpose of teleporting the avatar

I have two prims that when clicked on will teleport the user to another location. The first is just in front of the location that the avatar spawns at on my build platform. This prim teleports the avatar to the start of my maze.
The second is if the user clicks on the spiral viewing platform then it teleports them to the top.

Prim movement through scripting

The maze doors a scripted to move. I have linked up two sets of three doors. They work through the same prim on/off system as the orb particles do. With this though I have linked the script in the link so that it covers all the doors in that set. I have done the same for the other set. I then offset the doors so one set were in the maze and the other were above. I then swapped the script parameters so that they start by either moving the doors up or down.